Megyn Kelly cuts off Tom Brokaw as he criticizes the NRA

UPDATE: since this morning’s broadcast, Tom Brokaw has clarified to the Washington Postthat the interruption was not any form of censoring on Kelly’s part and was instead due to his malfunctioning hearing-aids.

He told the Post, “The acoustics in the studio were terrible. I didn’t have an IFB [earpiece], and I am writing as I return from my hearing-aid mechanic. My hearing aid this morning went bad as the show started. Chick Hearn, the late, great L.A. Lakers play-by-play announcer had a phrase: no harm, no foul. Exactly the case this a.m. No harm, no foul. Not worth any fuss. I’m a Kelly fan.”

After a first week full of awkward mistakes, Megyn Kelly Today is still finding its legs, making for some truly painful TV. Like Tuesday, when Kelly cut off legendary journalist and longtime NBC News anchor Tom Brokaw.

Brokaw was part of a panel there to talk about the shooting in Las Vegas. During a Q&A segment with the audience, a man asked Brokaw about the effects of the nonstop, 24-hour news coverage of the tragic event.

Rather than answer the man’s question, Brokaw lambasted the National Rifle Association (NRA) for its role in making guns like the ones used in Vegas widely available: “I would say to this audience, and any audience before which I appear these days, we are where we are because of the power of people who wanted these kinds of guns, and the NRA managed to organize them and get them as a political force in America. …

“The NRA has a lot of money, obviously, and if you’re running against the NRA — in a lot of the Western congressional districts, for example — you’re portrayed as a traitor to America.“

While Brokaw was seemingly far from finished, Kelly cut in and began to speak because, she said, they had a “hard break” — or in other words, a commercial they really had to get to. But Brokaw continued to speak for several seconds, making for quite the awkward moment.